A.N –I know I've not written anything for months. I'm a bad writer (or a bad writter if you ask Namuh-Flah). I've even had this chapter finished for weeks, and a rough draft of the next chapter for about six months. I blame it on a stubborn third chapter that won't cooperate.
This is set somewhere between Astonishing X-Men #6 and #13.
Disclaimer – I don't own the X-Men. If I did, there wouldn't be the one-in, one-out policy that seems to be operating at the moment.
Kitty Pryde sat and stared out at the grounds from between the watery bars on her window. Rain battered a few young trees that had been planted a few weeks before the start of term. It's a shame Kitty thought that they won't even get the chance to be destroyed by this week's in-villain. They will be killed by rain. Not even the vague dignity of being hit by a stray superhuman teenager.
Some of whom will be very unhappy if they don't get their tests back tomorrow she remembered. She picked up the pile of papers sitting in front of her on her desk and recounted for what must have been approaching the hundredth time how many she had left. The number was still the same. Groaning, Kitty picked up her pen to resume marking, read the first page of answers and somehow, ten minutes later, found that she had been tracing the lines of running raindrops on her window rather than ticking and crossing the answers on the page.
Kitty was in a bad mood. The morning had been beautiful, but most of her classes that day were before lunch. She had been planning on taking a pile of coursework that needed marking outside, but five minutes before the end of the lesson the sky clouded over and by the time the bell rang murky puddles were already forming outside.
After lunch, Kitty had sat in her room, trying to focus on the papers in front of her and ignore the idea of going to the library to watch some of the older student's lively debate on what they should nickname the cure. Very funny as this was it was not very useful if you were trying to be constructive.
Finally after several hours of marking and watching the outside world (one for far more time than necessary) she put a marked paper on the completed pile and found that there were none that had not been checked. She leant back in her chair and stretched, reminding the muscles in her arms, back, neck and legs that this was not their natural position.
Then there was a noise at her window. Kitty looked up to see Lockheed tapping her window, water pouring off his wings and a disgruntled look on his face. "Alright, I've got you," Kitty said, leaning over to open the window while making sure the papers were firmly weighted down with a Yoda bobbing-head figure she had acquired years ago and now lived in her pile of keep-for-sentimental-reasons-junk. As the window clicked open, Lockheed swooped into the room, knocking Yoda aside, nodding. An image of the Jedi cautioning the dragon formed in Kitty's mind, but before she was able to collapse into fits of giggles a gust of wind shrieked in, scattering the papers. Kitty struggled to push the window closed, and when she turned round Lockheed was sitting right in the middle of her afternoon's work. "Come on dragon, I need to pick these up. You going to move?" Kitty asked hoping Lockheed wasn't feeling too scorned at having been drenched. Slowly Lockheed stood, beat his wings a couple of times to rid them of the last remaining drops of rain water and took off. He glided gracefully to Kitty's shoulder, revealing muddy claw prints over a few of the papers.
Kitty looked from the dragon on her shoulder to the brown shapes on the paper and back to her shoulder. "There isn't any point hoping that you left all the mud on the papers is it?" Lockheed curled around her neck so he had paws resting on both shoulders. "Let's get your claws washed," she said. She walked into the ensuite bathroom and ran some water into the basin. When she switched the taps off, Lockheed jumped in. Kitty phased just before half the contents of the sink sprayed the mirror and walls.
She left Lockheed splashing in the warm water and went to inspect the damage. The papers had escaped unharmed with the claws only on the margins. They'll probably just think it's cute, Kitty thought as she registered which students would be receiving Lockheed prints as well as a grade. They spend enough time giving him food. Her light blue t-shirt was ruined however.
As Kitty opened her drawer to find a new t-shirt the school bell rang for the last lesson of the day. Kitty had a class now. And she had forgotten. This was not good.
She grabbed a jumper to hide the brown marks sitting on her shoulder and, hoping that Lockheed wouldn't completely flood her bathroom, Kitty raced through the school, trying to reach her class before they managed to destroy the classroom. It wasn't that they were a horror to teach, more that they were all at different stages and had all had different levels of exposure to computers before they came to the school. So those who already knew how to copy and paste images and conduct internet searches were bored stiff while Kitty tried to get everyone else to the same level. It wouldn't last for long, but maybe just long enough to cause a mutiny.
As she drew into the corridor she slowed, so that she entered the classroom in what she hoped was a vaguely dignified manner. From the whispers and sniggers, Kitty guessed she hadn't achieved her goal. She put on what she hoped was a brave face and turned on the projector that sat at the front of the class.
"Right, just this lesson left, then you're free for the evening. Lucky you," Kitty addressed the class, turning to face them while she waited for the projector to warm up. "So, I think we'd just finished the section on Spreadsheets. Or is there anyone who needs things checking before we move on?" Blank faces met her scan around the classroom. A couple of them were looking at their hands, studying them intently. Others were biting their lowers lips as if trying to prevent a sound escaping. What did I interrupt? Kitty wondered. It must have been good. I'll see if I can get it out of them later; I definitely need cheering up.
"Everyone sure they're ok?" Kitty said, trying to buy time for the projector to warm up. It had apparently never worked that well and Kitty had been meaning to look at it and see if she could change anything to make it warm up more quickly for a few weeks, but the homework was taking up as much of her time as when she had been the one who had to complete it. "Right then, I think today we'll move on to… What?"
On the projector was a picture that had haunted her for nearly a decade. Her thirteen year old self was laughing, totally unaware of whoever was holding the camera (she'd never managed to track them down). The thing that annoyed her most was that if she had known the photo was being taken, at the time she wouldn't have cared. She was wearing the first costume she had ever designed herself. Lots of neon colours, thigh high stripy socks, and roller skates - she had seen how awful it was a few months later, and burned the original photograph. But somehow copies of it kept on popping up. It was a lot more resilient than the mansion that housed it. She was beginning to suspect there were outside forces at work.
Glancing over to her computer Kitty saw the image was displayed there. So the projector wasn't connected to a different source. I guess I've found what they were laughing at Kitty thought gloomily. She was standing staring at the two. Muffled giggles were coming from behind her, partly she suspected from her reaction. Ok, embarrassing dream over, time to wake up now, Kitty hoped. Please? No? Yeah, this is just great. Come on Kitty, you're a responsible teacher. What do responsible teachers do when they are mortified? Kitty cast around her brain for memories from Deerfield, before she met the X-Men. She'd never had a teacher who was so embarrassed that they froze. Right, time to improvise.
Kitty walked over to the computer and deftly pulled the image off the screen. After quickly checking no one had decided to alter her computer wallpaper she turned and looked pointedly at the class. "I was thirteen. Remember that. And also remember that when I find out who ever is responsible for this, they are going to pay, as in if-possible-training-sessions-with-Mr-Logan pay. Am I understood?"
The class nodded. They had all stopped laughing.